Cordea Savills Real Invest 1 buys two German assets for over EUR120 million

Cordea Savills Real Invest 1 buys two German assets for over EUR120 million

Cordea Savills, the international property fund manager, has purchased two assets for over EUR120 million after further fundraising on behalf of Cordea Savills Real Invest 1, a German “Spezialfonds” for institutional investors.

The first acquisition is the “Friedrichs-Carré”, an office scheme in Stuttgart's Central Business District. Completed in 2002, the scheme covers more than 20,000 square metres and includes retail and restaurant units. It was sold by Bayerische Apothekenversorgung, the pension fund of Bavarian pharmacists, represented by the Bavarian Pension Fund (Bayerische Versorgungskammer).

The second acquisition was the “Glückaufhaus” office building in Essen. The scheme was developed in 2009 behind a listed facade in a prime location in Essen's corporate and cultural quarter on the boundary to the Rüttenscheid district. It is the headquarters of ifm, a family-owned group active in automation engineering. The property was sold by a local community of investors.

Hans-Dieter Martin, managing director of Cordea Savills Invest, says: “It is particularly reassuring to see that we acquired not once but twice on behalf of our investors in this strongly contested market, and that the assets we acquired are such high-quality properties.”

The “Spezialfonds”, launched in September last year via Cordea Savills Invest, a German BaFin approved investment company, now holds equity commitments of circa EUR160 million from a group of German insurance companies. Proceeds from the first fundraising of EUR65 million in 2013 were invested in a forward commitment to purchase “Dortmunder U – Das Viertel”, a public private partnership project in Dortmund comprising two vocational colleges with places for circa 6,000 students.

The fund’s strategy is focused on modern offices or mixed-use buildings in the top seven German cities, with lot sizes of between EUR30 million and EUR70 million.